Guide to creating your School Environmental

Management Plan
What is a SEMP?

This guide

A School Environment Management Plan (SEMP) is a document

that sets out the school communitys intentions in regard to
environmental education and environmental management. It
represents an agreement to work together across the whole
school.

This guide is designed to be used in conjunction with the SEMP

Template. It provides you with information on using the SEMP
Template and conducting your sustainability planning. The SEMP
Template is a Word document can be adapted to your local school
priorities, branding and community.

The final SEMP is in two parts. The first section describes

the overall vision and sustainability objectives of the school.
The second section outlines the sustainability actions to be
undertaken by the school to achieve the objectives.

For further information on whole school planning for sustainability,

example SEMPs, case studies and other resources, and to join the
Sustainable Schools NSW community, visit the Sustainable Schools
NSW website at sustainableschools.nsw.edu.au

Section One

Cover page
Insert the name of your school
School logo (optional) (ensure the file is saved in an
appropriate format eg jpeg and that the file is not too large,
around 40kb is best use photo editing program to reduce
the photo size if necessary)
Authors of the plan - while one person may take responsibility
for writing this plan, there may be many people in the school
community who contribute ideas and activities. It is important
to acknowledge everyone involved.
Contact details for the school

About <school>
Principals statement
This is an opportunity for the Principal to provide an introductory
statement about the plan, activities or how it fits into the context
of the school.

School Vision/Mission statement

Most schools have a vision or mission statement. This SEMP and
the actions in it would ideally be compatible with the schools
main vision. Visit the Resource Centre on the Sustainable Schools
NSW website for guidelines on Developing a Vision Statement.

Management and planning priorities

Schools have specific management and curriculum priorities
they seek to address, often described in the school plan.

sustainableschools.nsw.edu.au

Linking your SEMP to the strategies or actions in these plans

helps to support both school, curriculum and environmental
objectives. For example: increasing literacy levels in students
or increasing student engagement through student centred
projects or extending the educational potential of their school,
by developing an outdoor learning space a school planning and
environmental target.

School profile and background

Describe your schools history and current priorities. Provide an
overview of the schools history, identify what is important to
the school community and some of the more general issues
that the school is dealing with. This will provide background for
environmental education activities.

About the local environment and community

Your school is part of the local and regional environment. The
broader school community may focus on particular issues such
as salinity, local biodiversity, development issues, and water. Build
a picture of the local area to help contextualise the schools and
communitys vision and environmental goals. Understanding who
is in the local community can assist the school to plan activities
that are locally relevant and supported. The school, the students,
their parents, local residents, government, business and industry
are all parts of the local school community. They can provide ideas
and resources, and the school can often assist the community to
implement important local activities.

Environmental education achievements

About this plan

For many schools, environmental education activities large

and small have been ongoing for a number of years. These
might include:

Environmental vision

Teaching environmental education

Implementing programs such as paper recycling and
grounds improvements
Undertaking audits
Supporting student-led environmental initiatives
Recording and reflecting on achievements can assist in
planning the schools next steps. Communicating and
celebrating achievements so far will also inform the
community about your schools progress and allow the
school to reflect on, and feel positive and motivated about its
activities.

This plan fits into the whole school

planning through the following:

Focus area goals

Curriculum:

Integrated with relevant school policies

The SEMP should support curriculum goals for the school

and integrate sustainability concepts into school programs,
lessons and student activities. Consider how environmental
education might fit into existing curriculum goals or
write new goals that support environmental learning. For
example: There is a greater understanding and awareness
of environmental education opportunities in the curriculum
or Environmental education is embedded in the scope
and sequence of literacy programs or Sustainability skills
development from K-6 is sequenced to match student
development.

Integrated with school administration and management

procedures

Resource management:

An effective SEMP is integrated into other strategic, planning

and operational aspects of the school. It may be one or more
of the following:
The schools strategic management plan
Part of the school annual plan
Reported on in the school annual report

Integrated with curriculum programs

Information provided in the school prospectus or on the
school website
Consultation with Student Representative Council
Consultation with Parents and Citizens or Friends
organisations
Links to regional education and local government
planning

Describing the resource management goals enables a school

to set realistic targets to reduce use through environmental
management and learning activities. For example: the school
community has a greater understanding of how resources
are used in the school or Resource use within the school is
reduced by 10% or To lessen our impact on the environment
by focusing on water and energy use. Visit the Resource
Centre on the Sustainable Schools NSW website for help in
resource management.

Links to extra-curricular activities for students

Grounds management:

Environmental team

School grounds are sites for learning, biodiversity, playing

and many other activities. It is often a challenge to identify
a goal with so many diverse uses. However a defined,
achievable and measurable school grounds goal can provide
clear direction for grounds planning and improvements. For
example: Increase biodiversity and associated learning within
the school grounds or Create outdoor learning spaces that
will support teaching and learning or Gain an understanding
of the opportunities for learning in the school grounds. Visit
the Resource Centre on the Sustainable Schools NSW website
for help in grounds management.

Many schools give the school teams a name, so why not the
schools team of environmental leaders? If the team doesnt
have a specific identifiable name, delete the Name heading.
What is important is that the environment team represents
the full breadth of the school community. For example:
teachers, parents, administration staff, grounds staff, school
principal, students, community groups, council staff, local
media etc.

As well as a school vision or mission statement, it is useful to

have a shared environmental vision as it will help prioritise
and focus your schools activities. The many individuals
that make up your school community will have a personal
environmental vision for themselves, their own local
environment and possibly for their school and the global
environment. Bringing these together forms the basis for a
collective vision, some as simple as Our school will promote
environmental responsibility and action in students. Visit the
Resource Centre on the Sustainable Schools NSW website for
help in developing a vision statement and case studies.

Guide to creating your School Environmental Management Plan

Whole school planning:

The SEMP is a plan that can support the overall strategic
planning processes of the school. By cross-referencing whole
school goals in the SEMP, the school will develop a strong
rationale for projects and activities, and in turn this may help
prioritise the actions described in the SEMP or the School
Plan. For example: Sustainable High School will be reviewing
all Stage 4 and 5 programs in 2011 with the aim of increasing
authentic problem solving using environmental issues and
the school as the real life context. Visit the Resource Centre
on the Sustainable Schools NSW website for help in whole
school planning.

School community participation:

The SEMP will help focus and extend the relationship and
shared projects that a school has with its community. These

should be contextualised within the environmental

and educational aims of the school. Having a shared or
common understanding of environmental goals will help
the school and the wider community in their individual
and shared efforts. Some work may need to be undertaken
between the school and the community in order to fully
explore, understand and articulate these goals. Some
current actions include Clean-up Australia Day and Tidy
Towns.

Celebrating progress:
Outline the types of activities the school will conduct in
order to celebrate the success of your actions in relation to
environmental and sustainability education. For example:
reporting in Annual School Report, community newletters
or local paper, functions (thank you morning tea etc).

Section two
Section 2 is designed to be appendices to the Plan.

Appendix A: Actions
An action describes the specific activity that will be
undertaken within your school. You can add whatever you
need to here, just copy and paste the table.
A strategic approach to resolving the issue may require action
in more than one focus area such as curriculum, whole school
planning and perhaps grounds. The school is therefore asked
to consider strategies and actions for each issue across the
five focus areas of Curriculum, School Resources, School
Grounds Management, Whole School Planning and School
Community Participation.

Appendix B: Community and

environment Network
Which organisations are actively involved in your school
activities? They may be long term supporters or be involved
in a specific program. List the organisation and the type of
assistance provided. This is a way of ensuring that contact
information about school networks is not lost over time and
with the movement of staff in and out of the school.

Appendix C: Evaluating School

Achievements
How will your school plan, track and evaluate its
achievements? An evaluation plan identifies the progress
made towards the goals that you set out to achieve. The
goals should be identified within each focus area, and list the
actions taken and what was achieved.

Guide to creating your School Environmental Management Plan

Published by:
Office of Environment and Heritage,
Department of Premier and Cabinet
59 Goulburn Street, Sydney NSW 2000
PO Box A290, Sydney South NSW 1232
Phone: (02) 9995 5000 (switchboard)
Fax: (02) 9995 5999 TTY: (02) 9211 4723
Email: info@sustainableschools.nsw.edu.au
Website: sustainableschools.nsw.edu.au
Every effort has been made to ensure that the
information in this publication is accurate at the time of
publication. However, as appropriate, you should obtain
independent advice before making any decision based
on this information
OEH 2012/0183